We Have Each Other
by FMAsonlyAlice
Summary: Edward and Al continue to fight and come closer and closer to finding the answers to the questions their journey has posed for them with the help and prodding of a concerned Colonel Mustang. I don't exactly know what to say because I haven't decided how I"m going to finish this. Rated T for now, yaoi later on, deepening of relationships... Just read it! DX
1. Perfect

The sun shines the same every day, but not so. It rises from the east every morning, sometimes to a cloud free sky, sometimes to a sky mottled with small bits of clouds from the night before, soon to evaporate in the warm rays of morning, and sometimes almost completely obscured behind a thick, downy blanket. It begins its daily climb, slowly inching toward its zenith, marking high noon, then down into the west. The same every day, but not so. Even when the days are dark and rain falls heavily upon the Amestrian civilians, officers, and merchants, the sun still shines somewhere above the atmosphere's distress.

On such days when the rain and sleet showers down upon the land, the citizens tend to migrate indoors and let the gloom overtake them, keeping even their toes crossed in hopes that the sun might hear their silent pleas and make an appearance. Small children commuting on foot to and from school make messes of themselves in puddles, their knowing parents dressing them in the in-season garb of plastic and rubber over their civvies to keep them dry and presentable.

It was on one of these days in Central City, when the streets were mostly devoid of human traffic and few cars drove seemingly listlessly about in hopes of meeting their destinations in due time, that Major Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist sat, drenched on the edge of a fountain in the middle of the Central HQ lawn with his little brother, Alphonse, a seven foot tall suit of armor, former collectible item of their runaway father's. They sat staring ahead. Al had given up on telling his brother that he'd catch a cold in the rain, so he remained silent, listening to the heavy thrumming the rain made as it landed upon everything, the wet plops as it connected with the water in the fountain, the hollow _pangs_ as it bounced off his body, watching the white clouds alternately forming in front of his brother's slightly parted lips, the fans of water trailing what vehicles did pass, the way those fans cascaded down onto the ground, splashing the puddles noisily.

Edward was dripping. He sat with his feet splayed out in front of him and his hands in his pockets, which made no difference, seeing as his clothes were completely soaked through and there was no warmth to find there. He had begun to shiver a while ago, but he had made no move to go inside. The grass in front of him had almost an inch of water throughout, every step by anybody eliciting a splash that soaked through their footwear faster than anybody wanted. He stared at his boots, watching as the drops of water beaded and collected into larger drops to then slide down to the heel and become part of the lawn-wide puddle. He was cold, but so lost in thought he didn't care.

"Who do you think she was?" Edward asked nobody. He heard the slight _clank_ as his brother turned his head, but remained silent.

Al didn't know who she was either. He had seen her, lying on her back, hair like Rumpelstiltskin's finest spun gold splayed beneath her, her eyes closed as if sleeping on the almost substanceless floor of the pure white space between the Truth and his Gate. It had been six years since then and it always managed to find its way back into the older Elric's mind. Al knew it wasn't all that was bothering his brother, however, so he made his statement hoping his brother would take it as a suggestion to get him out of the rain.

"You're going to have to see him sometime, Brother."

There was a short moment of silence in which Edward pulled his feet beneath him and leaned forward while taking his hands out of his pockets and studying his gloved palms.

"I know." He stood and stretched, water running downhis neck and back, his trademark red jacket clinging to his body. "I think I need to do this alone, Al, if you don't mind."

Al knew why. He stood when his brother did. "I'll go back to the dorm and make you some dinner, then. I'm going to stop by the market and get some medicine, too."

Ed nodded without meeting Al's gaze and handed him a few bills, sufficient enough for medicine and whatever else Al felt they might need.

Al watched after his brother as Ed made his way toward the steps of Central HQ, and then beyond the doors. Al would not worry. He'd promised Ed he wouldn't. But it didn't keep the feeling from creeping up within him.

* * *

As the rain outside slammed noisily upon everything, creating something of a cacophonous silence, so it did inside as well. The office was quiet, save for the rustling of papers and shuffling of footsteps outside the doors leading into the outer office, Havoc's occasional cough, and Feury's sniffling. Colonel Roy Mustang lazily opened another folder and skirted his eyes across the words, none of it registering. He stared at the paper, his chin in his palm, until he realized he wasn't going to be able to focus without a break. He glanced up at 1st Lieutenant Hawkeye, quiet at her desk while organizing files to be submitted to General Hakuro and others to be looked over by the colonel, then scooted his chair back and turned around to look out the window.

Three stories down, he saw a red splotch on the edge of the fountain in the middle of the lawn. He stood and peered through the window and the rain and determined it to be Fullmetal. A large part of him wanted to open the window and shout at the teen, telling him to get his ass into the building before he catches a cold, then further scold him about taking better care of himself. He knew the advice, however administered, would fall on deaf ears, so he dismissed the idea. Instead, he frowned as he watched for a few minutes, then turned back to Hawkeye when he noticed her corner fall silent. She was watching him, but made no move to convince the colonel to get back to work. She must have understood that he was almost overworked for the day. He turned back to the window.

Ed was standing and slowly making his way to the entrance of Central HQ. Mustang knew coming inside wouldn't save the teen from a cold, but at least he was coming inside. He watched as Alphonse stood in the rain while his brother walked away, then turned toward the road and headed toward the nearest market.

He sighed and turned back to his desk, waiting for the moment when Fullmetal would enter through the outer office doors and make a racket, perhaps going off about the colonel's own incompetency and how his last mission was so boring.

It was a good ten minutes later and the door to the outer office opened quietly. A very wet Fullmetal stepped through and closed the door quietly behind him. Roy looked up, ready to make a comment, but stopped when he saw Fullmetal's tired eyes and sad visage. He quickly closed his mouth and said nothing.

"Hey, Chief! How's it goin'?" Havoc asked, leaning back in his chair.

Edward looked at him and smiled a small smile. "Not bad, how about you?"

Havoc's smile quickly turned down and his brows furrowed. His unlit cigarette pointed downward as he looked at Ed, obviously weirded out. "Pretty good."

Fullmetal quickly broke eye contact with him and looked at the floor as he entered Mustang's inner office, trailing small puddles behind him.

Mustang schooled his features as he watched the teen enter his inner office and waited till Ed was in the doors before saying, "Do you finally have that report that I needed a few days ago?"

Ed looked at him apologetically as he shook his head and moved to sit on one of the black leather couches in front of Mustang's desk.

"Oh, no you don't!" Mustang quickly shouted and jumped from his chair to stalk to Fullmetal. Edward looked at him surprised. "Hawkeye, please close the door on your way out!"

She looked up at him, gathered up her work and left the office.

"What do you think you're doing? You can't sit on the couch all wet like that! That is genuine leather! You'll ruin it!"

Ed looked at the floor.

Mustang furrowed his eyebrows together at the lack of response and sighed. He left Ed standing there and walked to the resting room adjacent to his office and came back with a few towels. He set them of the coffee table and stared at Ed, who had made no move to take them when they had been offered. It was quiet for a few moments, then Mustang stepped closer to the teen. Ed made to move to back away. He rested a hand on Ed's flesh shoulder and the boy stiffened slightly at his touch, but was quick to relax. Mustang then proceeded to remove the boy's coat.

He had never seen Ed like this. Well, of course he had, but usually Fullmetal would say he was fine and would move on to sulk somewhere he wouldn't be seen. Ed had never let himself become completely soaked when his brother was around to take care of him, let alone enter the office silently.

Fullmetal shrugged to let his coat slip to the floor. Mustang was holding on to it, so it never made it that far. He held it with one hand and looked at Fullmetal's back, his braided hair and clothes clinging to his body. He placed a hand on the sixteen year old's shoulder and pulled him towards the door to the resting room.

There was a bed and a bathroom in there. It was almost made up like a normal bedroom, with a nightstand on each side of the bed and a dresser that the colonel had slowly filled with his own civvies as time went on for the times he would be in the office all night or decided it wasn't worth it to go home.

He led Ed into the room and closed the door. Ed stopped before the bed and turned around, looking at him, but making no move to sit or speak. Mustang sighed again and approached the teen, making to pull off the boy's shirt. Edward simply stared up at him, his face unreadable. Mustang tugged to get Ed's tank top out from under the boy's pants, but he was too wet and it stuck, so he resorted to taking off Ed's belt first. He unbuckled it and tugged it through the loops , unbuttoned Ed's pants, then pried his fingers between the fabric folds to find the zipper tab, promptly pulling it down when he did.

Fullmetal kept staring at him. It disturbed him and he worried at Fullmetal's silence, the boy's lack of response bordering on annoyance. He didn't have time to be babysitting Amestris' most famous brat. He didn't have to do this. But the boy was under his command, and having him sick would only mess up a lot of things, including Mustang's reputation. He tried not to meet Ed's eyes as he stripped him down to his boxers.

Ed continued to stand quietly, not making any moves to help get undressed, and when Mustang realized he would need to get the boy's boots off, he promptly pushed him backwards and Ed caught himself on the edge of the bed before sitting. Mustang pulled Ed's boots off, yanked his pants down off his feet, and then set them on Ed's coat. He did the same with Ed's shirt after asking him to lift his arms because, god forbid, he wasn't going to tear it off the boy. Ed complied and dropped them as soon as his hands were free. His eyes continued to follow mustang and he laid Ed's tank top on the pile of clothes he had begun and moved to peel off the boy's socks.

Mustang was trying his best to avoid making contact with Fullmetal's eyes, which hadn't left him in the several minutes it was taking him to strip the teen free of his clothes.

* * *

Edward watched Mustang's face as the man carefully peeled his clothes off. He was sitting now and was wondering how far this was going to go. Would Mustang even take off his boxers? Would he make a move to touch him? Would he take advantage to the teen and try to seduce him? Or has he been silently plotting how he would yell at Ed and get angry for not taking care of himself?

Mustang didn't have a look on his face that said he was interested in touching Ed. He had his eyebrows furrowed in concern, probably for his reputation. _Ha!_ Ed let the sides of his mouth curl up slightly at that, but the smile faded as quickly as it came. The colonel seemed more patient than normal, much more caring. He successfully peeled off Ed's socks and then pulled Ed forward a little to undo his braid. Ed leaned forward slightly and closed his eyes and he felt Mustang's fingers try to separate the wet locks.

Edward looked back up at Mustang's face and watched as the man's eyes considered him up and down. He suddenly felt ashamed that Mustang could see the scars coming from beneath his automail cuffs. His eyes flickered down to Mustang's feet and he pursed his lips. He saw the older man's military-issue black, leather boots turn and walk toward the door. He looked up and watched him disappear, then return with the towels he had left in the office. His eyes trailed the colonel as he stopped in front of him, holding the towels, pausing before bending to pull Edward to his feet.

He closed his eyes as he felt the older man begin to dry him off. He didn't even know why he was letting him take care of him, but he didn't care either. It felt good, having somebody else quietly care for him without question. He made a mental note to sneakily get the colonel to take care of him like this again sometime. He rather liked it, not that he'd ever admit that.

A towel was placed on his head and he opened his eyes, focusing on the fuzzy cloth over them and listening as the colonel walked to the dresser and pulled open a drawer. He pulled the towel off his head and began scrunch-drying his hair then turned to look around the room. He started as a small pile of clothes was thrust into his face by a very unenthused colonel and he took them, looking up at the colonel's face. Mustang quickly left the room, closing the door behind him.

Ed slipped out of his boxers and dried his bits off with the towel before pulling a pair of grey sweatpants up, cinching in the waist and rolling them up so they wouldn't drag on the floor, then pulling the black t-shirt over his head and flipping his hair through the head-hole. He stood there by the bed uncertain of what to do, then sat back down.

* * *

It was a good hour or so before Fullmetal exited the resting room. He looked even smaller in mustang's clothes but he kept that to himself given the fact that Fullmetal's face was still unreadable and withdrawn. He watched as Fullmetal sat on one of the leather couches and curled up against the armrest, staring at the coffee table and hugging one of the pillows to his chest. Still, it was a good twenty minutes before Fullmetal spoke.

"Everything was perfect..."


	2. Saint

Roy had known that someday his youngest subordinate would open up to him. At first, when Edward was twelve and had passed the state alchemist exam, he was impatient and he asked questions the young blond seemed more than reluctant to answer. Edward would shrug and reply yes or no, and say nothing when he deemed the information too much. The biggest question Roy had ever had was the one everybody was asking. Not just anybody, though, mostly alchemists. The rest of the population knew what alchemy was and they knew the basics of how it worked, so they rarely asked questions regarding the Fullmetal Alchemist's way of using of it. There were people out there, scientists that would kill to get their hands on him, to interrogate him, but like everybody else, they knew that was near impossible. Fullmetal simply knew how to evade capture. Getting around the advanced martial arts he had so thoroughly engrained into his body and mind at such a young age made it difficult. He was not an easy target for anybody.

And yet, he was. Almost the entire country knew what he looked like. There was nobody with eyes his color, and nobody had ever become a state alchemist at twelve. _Twelve!_

Of course, just like those people, the Flame Alchemist did have questions, most of which he kept to himself, many he asked outright, only some of them answered. Edward did not speak when he did not want to. When it came to anything having to do with how he lost his arm and leg, he would reply that he was involved in an accident during the war in Ishval. Roy could tell the boy did not like lying, but to keep his secret safe, he had to. It wasn't hard. Where he lived in Resembool was quite close to where the battles took place. His answer to the clap-slap-alchemy technique, though, a simple, "I just can, I guess."

It infuriated many people, how vague he was, how young he was, how he excelled in all things so easily they themselves had to commit a lifetime to. It wasn't hard to tell that it did bother Fullmetal. He could tell that people either liked him or loathed him.

He had been a dog, more like a puppy (Mustang's lips turned up at that thought) of the military for five years. He still hadn't seen the things Roy had seen, still hadn't experienced the darkness that was war. And yet, he had. He'd seen more than any child of ten ever should have, and that left him a darkened spirit, completely focused on getting his brother's body back and nothing in all the world could ever stop him.

Mustang knew the boy's focus on finding the philosopher's stone and restoring his brother's body was part of the reason Edward never opened up. He decided he wasn't going to push him, though, and was going to do what he can to see that the Elric brothers' make real what they set out to find.

As soon as he heard Fullmetal speak, he looked up, not completely surprised, but surprised nonetheless at the boy's choice of wording. Perfect? What was perfect? Nothing in the world could ever be deemed perfect, especially by a scientist who knew better to discard that word from his or her working dictionary. His pen stopped scribbling and there were a few moments of silence, in which Mustang came to a conclusion.

Not the place. Not here.

Instead of waiting silently for the boy to continue, he set down his pen, pushed out his chair and stood to then proceed to walk around his desk and stop in front of Fullmetal.

Edward lifted his eyes, but not high enough to meet Roy's gaze and seemed to be staring at the man's belt.

"I'm not going to tell you that I don't want to hear what you have to say, because I really do. But I can't have this discussion happening in my office when I have work to do and you have a stone to find."

Fullmetal looked a little defeated. Almost like he had been very ready to pour his emotions and experiences out onto the coffee table in front of him and he looked about ready to close himself off again. Roy placed a hand on the boy's shoulder and bent to look at him. Edward reluctantly met his gaze, suddenly angry.

_Tip-toeing on broken mirrors, scattered and warped reflections of a thousand pieces of you… which one is you?_

"You know me, always trying to get out of doing anything resembling paperwork. Would you be willing to continue this discussion elsewhere?"

The anger Fullmetal seemed to have mustered almost visibly dropped off his face and was replaced with confusion, maybe even disbelief. He pressed his lips together and slowly nodded and watched as Mustang took his hand from his shoulder and straightened to retrieve his long black trench and umbrella.

Edward gathered his clothes, not willing to leave them in the resting room, and lifted his palms together. Mustang had never seen Edward do anything but clap loudly when he wanted to perform a transmutation, but this was interesting. Edward placed his hands on his clothes and steam erupted from the cloth, billowing up and heating the office, which was already pleasantly warm. That slow motion to bring his hands together, that sadness on his face and almost self-resentment shone there as he slowly went about his transmutation. It was almost heart wrenching.

With his boots and socks now dry, he pulled them on, making no move to replace Mustang's clothes with his own and waited while Mustang watched. Roy shrugged and moved to the door and opened it.

Hawkeye looked up from a desk just outside his door and narrowed her eyes at him when he exited, obviously ready to leave for the afternoon. After all, it was only 3 pm. He shouldn't be leaving for another three hours! But when Edward left the office behind him with a look on his face that said he needed somebody right now, she closed her previously opened mouth and bit back her response, then nodded and resumed her filing. Everybody else in the office remained silent as Mustang locked his inner office and left with Fullmetal following close behind, his hair still down and damp. It was almost as if the rain outside had sucked their spirits out of them.

Roy didn't notice that Edward had stopped walking when he pulled out his umbrella and headed out into the rain until he looked back and saw him standing there, looking up. The light from the doors turned Fullmetal into a stark outline against the rest of the world, and he was looking up into the rain, almost like he was asking for forgiveness, almost like his slow and soundless transmutation earlier had been a prayer.

Mustang cursed and turned back to the blond, taking the boy's hand and pulling him under the umbrella with him. "I'm not going to let you soak yourself again. Come on."

They walked the few blocks to Mustang's apartment in silence, feeling as if the rainwater might somehow collect and rise to drown them as it had just about all sound.

* * *

Edward paused in the doorway to the colonel's apartment. He had silently trailed the man up the stairs and down the hall, contemplating what he was going to say, how he was going to begin. He really had no idea, only that he knew he wanted to get it out, to have somebody that he could trust to keep a secret listen to him and possibly even console him. He knew he could trust the colonel. He knew he had no reason to _not_ trust him. But he was wary, and he was willing to take this chance. He might never get the chance to speak to him while the colonel was in a mood to listen again.

When Mustang turned in the foyer to wait for his guest to enter, Ed just stood there. Mustang shrugged and put his coat on the rack, then entered another room. Edward followed and closed the door quietly, wondering if he should lock it, not knowing if the man that lived there locked his doors or not while he was home. He decided against it and kicked his boots off before going to the room Mustang had disappeared into.

It was a kitchen. Mustang was making coffee. _How nice_…

"You should go to the den. We'll talk there."

Edward looked around, then back at the colonel, who nodded towards the door, leaving Edward to find the den himself. He turned to the door and peered down the hall, then back to Mustang who nodded, and crept to the nearest door which turned out to be a bathroom. But the door directly across from it opened up to a living space with two couches facing each other and a low coffee table between, much like the ones in the bastard's office, but made of a soft fabric. He stepped into the room and looked around before making his way to the nearest couch. There were books on the coffee table, a few of them about flame alchemy, others about modern politics. There were notebooks and papers scattered about the table with various arrays. Intrigued, Ed glanced over them, noting that they were not arrays he had seen before, and there were symbols he did not recognize which momentarily peeved him greatly. How could he not know these symbols?

He had busied himself looking over the symbolism of flame alchemy and trying to use the symbols he did know to help him 'translate' their meaning and didn't hear Mustang stop next to the couch with two mugs. It wasn't until he smelled the coffee that he turned his head and blushed, not liking to be caught shuffling through somebody else's business. He couldn't help himself.

Mustang handed him a mug and he took it gratefully, finally noticing how cold he had become and proceeded to ball himself on the couch and sip the steaming contents while the colonel snapped a fire into the brazier. It almost had an instant effect, and Edward began to relax into the cushions.

He watched as the colonel seated himself across from him and stared at the fire. It didn't seem like the man expected Edward to talk anytime soon and indeed he didn't for several minutes. They sipped their coffee, listening to the fire roaring in the fireplace and the rain on the window. As the weather had dampened the mood of the city, the fire made this room feel like home.

_There is no home for me._

His eyes looked the colonel over as he sat there, one hand holding his mug while resting it on his knee, the other hand on his face as he stared into the fire. It lit up his eyes, turning those dark pools into something more, well, alive. His otherwise pale skin took on a golden sheen and his hair… Nobody would guess that the man's hair was actually brown. The sun didn't even shine through the strands to show that small fact, but somehow a simple fire did. The man's lips were leaning toward thin, but still full enough to see and almost just as pale as the rest of his face. Edward wondered why he had never taken even a moment to realize just how attractive the man was somewhere between his ranting and raving.

Not that it mattered. Did it?

He quickly looked away to the fire, resting his face in his flesh palm, unintentionally mirroring the man across from him. "We had stopped going to school. Granny and Winry often got mad at us for skipping to practice alchemy…"

* * *

Mustang's eyes flicked to his subordinate when he heard his voice. He had almost thought that they were going to sit in silence together until the world stopped turning, and somehow, that didn't bother him. He turned his head and examined Edward as he spoke. As much as he and the rest of his staff made fun of Fullmetal for being so small, he knew that the boy was growing. He saw it every time Ed stepped into his office, or rather burst into his office. He was going to grow to be a fine young man.

"…Teacher told us the very first time she saw us, 'no matter what you do, you cannot bring back the dead.'." Edward paused. "It's not that we didn't listen to her. We heard her, and she would repeat herself often, but we thought she didn't know what she was talking about, so we opted to ignore her. When we thought we had trained enough, when we believed we were ready to handle such a huge transmutation, we went home and set out to do what we thought would bring our mother back."

His hair was on fire. Edward's golden locks were no longer wet, and it was still a tangled mess, but the way the light from the fire hit it…

_It's almost as if he lives to _be_ the fire._

Mustang quickly frowned. That made no sense.

"…and I told him while we stood there, holding our bleeding fingers over the ingredients, 'Meh! What is a soul, anyway?' We didn't quite believe they existed. Of course, I had no idea that I would learn that they did only a few minutes later..."

Mustang listened to Edward as he went over the details of the transmutation, the way he and his brother felt as they got closer to their goal, the soul-crushing realization that it hadn't worked, what the thing they had made looked like, how it had moaned in pain, trying to move.

The part that interested the colonel the most, because truly, he was a scientist as well, therefore very interested, was the details Edward gave of within the gate, the little black hands that took hold of him and pulled him in, screaming. They picked apart his leg first and then shoved him into a place that forced knowledge any alchemist would kill to know into his head. He had screamed, the pain of taking in so much information at once giving him a skull-splitting headache, but it was over before he knew it, and he had begged the Truth to let him see it again.

Mustang thought about the things Edward told him and had to fight himself to keep from letting his mind wander at the things he was learning and to focus on the teen on the other couch. He wanted to see this gate, he had to. But he knew better, and trusted what Ed told him. After all, he had considered it once. When he was back from the war, deemed a hero by most of the country because of his amazing skill with fire, how he could… _murder!..._ he told himself, so many people at once with just one blow. It had wounded him to no end to know that those lives were forever riding on his shoulders, that everywhere he went he left a trail of bright red blood smoking behind him on the ground.

Edward was a saint.

Edward was a god.

Of that he was sure.

"…but the Truth showed me how simple it was. You can't bring back the dead."


	3. Saving Me

**A/N I do believe that I might have decided on the parings for this fic, though I don't know if any of you will be happy to know about them, but I'm going to tell you anywayzah! Here they are: RusselEd, RoyEd, EdOC, AlWin, HavocAl, RoyOC, RoyRiza maybe (still thinking about that one...), WinOC. Most of these parings are going to be brief, but I don't need to tell you that, you'll be seeing for yourselves in the future, that is if you have the patience to keep up with me for the next MILLENIA! Of course, I really do hope I can end this, because I do tend to get carried away and go on forever...**

**DISCLAIMER****: As it should be obvious by the fact that my name is FMAsonlyAlice, I am not Hiromu Arakawa or Funimation and as such, do not own FMA, as much as I would love to. This is the only time I am going to put this disclaimer here, which is kinda late because it's already the third chapter, And I would expect all of you to know that without me saying it. But i just did out of respect fr the creators of FMA.**

**HEY! I already know where my story is going, but if any of you have any suggestions on what to write about, perhaps in a different fic, I'd be happy to look it over and do my best to make your dreams a reality... or at least a written fantasy... With that said... Enjoy Chapter three!**

* * *

There was a loud rumbling noise and Edward's voice trailed off at the interruption. The colonel stood, stretched, and offered to go and get some takeout. Edward didn't respond. Instead, he looked up at the man for the first time since he had started talking and blushed, suddenly embarrassed that his stomach had growled.

He suddenly didn't want to talk anymore, so he nodded and listened as the colonel left the room, fetched his umbrella and left Edward alone in the quite sizable apartment.

The rain was still coming down, but not in droves. It had slowed to a steady drizzle.

He didn't move for a few minutes, wondering why the colonel had left him alone without so much of a, 'Don't leave the den! Don't touch anything!' or a, 'Don't break anything!'

Not that it ever would have mattered. He wouldn't listen anyway. That damn bastard can suck it! Except that he had been a complete stranger to his usual self and acted as though he _wanted_ to hear every word Ed was saying, and that didn't bother Ed at all. He knew he could trust the man. He knew he could confide in him.

After sitting in silence for a few moments, he stood and stretched out his tired limbs, picked up the mugs and padded back to the kitchen, glad he remembered the way seeing as it was only a couple doors down toward the front door. He left the mugs in the sink and sat at the counter.

* * *

Because Ed was the only one of them that required food and sleep, which also meant he was the only one that needed fresh air and sunlight for his skin and was why Edward's bed was the one next to the window, Al had to sit on Ed's bed to look out of it. During times when he was alone, and sometimes being the only one awake with his sleeping brother there did count as being alone, he would read everything his brother didn't have the chance to.

Al researched while his brother slept, but not only things pertaining to the philosopher's stone, but a great many things as well, and waiting for his brother to return now and waiting for him to wake up in the morning was no different. He knew Ed wasn't going to be back for dinner, so he hadn't bothered making it. Instead he opted to put what he bought into the small fridge in the kitchen unit and the medicine in the bathroom, and then retired to the bedroom for the rest of the evening.

It was getting very late, not that many people would notice the passage of time due to the fact it had been dark all day what with the rain and stuff. He knew his brother was in a safe place and he wasn't about to go and find him. He'd just wait. It seemed it was what he did for most of his life after the tragedy they placed upon themselves. He waited.

* * *

The colonel wasn't gone for very long, so he couldn't have gone far. He returned little over a half hour later with Xingian takeout. Edward, glad for the food, attacked his boxes as soon as they were handed to him by a chuckling colonel. Aside from the lip-smacking and slurping coming from both of them, albeit from the colonel a much more polite slurping, they ate in silence.

There was nothing to say. Ed felt like the world was still glaring at him with judgmental eyes, but that didn't stop him from filling his stomach when he needed it.

He would be the first to admit that his appetite even surprised _him_! But he wasn't going to complain. The only thing shoveling food into his mouth kept him from doing was research, and even then he didn't mind doing both simultaneously.

He hadn't realized when he had stopped eating and when he had begun to stare at the grain of wood on the kitchen island counter before him with his face in the palm of his automail hand until Mustang stood and began to gather the empty boxes and he jumped to help.

"Sit back down, Edward. It's okay," the colonel said and Edward sat slowly, eyeing the colonel warily and not mentioning his sudden curiosity as to why the colonel had used his first name. He figured he knew, though.

"I… just don't like people doing things for me," he replied, wanting to get out of this awkward situation of sitting and watching.

"I know that," was Mustang's firm reply, throwing out a, "Don't get back up," when Ed made a move to stand. He quickly relaxed back into his seat and glared at the colonel's back as he went about throwing the things into the trash.

* * *

"I don't want to keep you reliving your past, because I understand that it was very traumatizing, trust me, I do, but my curiosity is killing me." The colonel watched the teen in front of him cautiously, hoping not to set him off. They had moved back into the den and he had brought in some pillows and blankets. They were sitting in front of the fireplace on the floor, Edward lying on his back.

"What was it like having the entire world's knowledge forced on you? What did you see?"

Silence was his reply. Mustang looked over at Ed and saw him staring thoughtfully at the ceiling, lines forming between his eyes, the gold orbs flicking from one end of the ceiling to the other as though he was watching a scene play out before him. It was minutes before he met the colonel's gaze, darkness clouding his irises.

The colonel frowned. "I'm sor…"

"Painful."

There was a quiet moment in which Mustang took to get over the initial shock of Ed's interruption. "I'm sorry. What?"

"It was painful," was Ed's calm reply.

Ed looked tired. Mustang didn't doubt it. Only hours before he was sitting in the rain which must have drained him, then he spent the following hours talking nonstop without interruption from the colonel, who sat and listened, questions springing up into his head at almost everything. He knew he'd get to all that later, so he listened. He could hear the hoarseness in Ed's voice from the strain of talking nonstop, but then it could be that as well as a cold setting in. He made a mental note to get the boy some medicine before they went to sleep.

"Having all of that information thrust upon you all at once, eons of information, centuries of memories flashed into your mind in seconds, yet you remember it all so clearly as if you had lived every minute of it. It's terrible, absolutely mind-splitting." He paused and searched the colonel's face. "It's not anything anybody was ever meant to see, and I saw it thrice." He looked away and frowned.

"But what did you see?" Mustang pressed. He knew Edward would never be able to tell him everything he saw. It would take lifetimes! But it wouldn't stop him from asking.

"Everything. The world, as previously and still thought, is not flat, but spherical. I saw the universe, the ends I stood on connecting in one continuous, perfect hoop, like a giant, astral doughnut."

_Trust Ed, even in his most brooding and darkest moments to relate the universe with a doughnut._

Mustang couldn't help but smirk.

"I was rushed through this reel of information, then suspended for what seemed like an eternity above the universe. It was over all too soon," he sighed. "I don't know when I realized it, but I was able to transmute without written circles_ because_ I saw that."

_Written?_

"The perfect circle within all of us, the universal circle, it threads through everything. Everything is made up of the same thing, tiny, tiny universes, tiny perfect circles around and throughout everything. It never ends." He was looking at his mismatched palms, no doubt thinking about the circle they made when he clapped them together,

"It sounds beautiful." Mustang tried to imagine the world spread out before him, curving in the distance to show the proof of a spherical shape, tried to fly higher than that and see the universe connecting in a colossal 'doughnut'.

_But where in this universe are we placed if not the center? And if there is no center, then where in the ring of the 'doughnut'? Are there other worlds like ours, floating randomly in the universe with us? Are there other universes?_

His inner scientist was clawing up his throat. He swallowed to shut him up.

"No. It's terrible. I thought it was so interesting and beautiful that I begged the Truth to let me see it again. It just laughed at me and that was when I realized my leg was gone. I was screaming. I was alone. Al had been taken and I didn't know what else to do, so I drew an array that I thought up as quickly as I could on my arms and remaining leg, put one on my forehead and one on my chest, grabbed the nearest suit of armor and drew one there, too. I was willing to sacrifice my own life to bring my brother back, and when I activated the array, the Truth told me that I must have been the stupidest person it had ever known.

"Then I went through the gate again. I was beyond overjoyed to see it again, but just like before, it was over too soon, and I woke up, barely able to breathe. Al was freaking out and he picked me up, wrapped me in a blanket and ran to Granny's house. She dressed my wounds." He was quiet for some time.

Mustang was wondering what he should ask next, his curiosity almost drowning out the concern he felt for Ed. Edward had seen so much, but he had seen so much that Mustang would love to see. He knew he never could because he knew what would have to be done. He shuddered at the memory of almost committing human transmutation and silently thanked god that he hadn't. He wouldn't be here if he had. Before he could ask another question, the teen had continued.

"That was the same night you showed up. You were wet from the rain and you stormed passed Granny into the house without asking, grabbed me by my shirtfront and screamed in my face. I didn't have a response at the time. I didn't know what to say.

"Everything had happened so fast, and then this stranger, for all I knew who could have been the angel of death, already come to collect me for my sin, came and screamed at me. After you calmed down and told me why you came, I thought about it, but not for long. If there was any chance that I could bring my brother's body back, I was going to take it." He looked over at the colonel. "If you hadn't have come that night I might have stayed there, wallowing in my own self-loathing for what I had done, not only to me, but to my brother. _Especially_ to my brother. If you hadn't have come and given me an opportunity to live, I wouldn't be here."

There was silence. They stared at each other for several minutes. Mustang mulled all he had heard over in his mind, the fact that he had shown up just after the transmutation. If he had been only a couple of hours earlier, he might have been able to stop them, he would see what they were about to do and keep them from doing it. But then again, if they had never have done it, they would never have signed up to become state alchemists. There would have been no reason. He would have returned to his office in East City empty-handed and would have continued his search for alchemists to recruit.

At first he had told Ed that he would need to be protected from the rest of the military because of his secret, he had told the boy, twelve at the time, that as the only person that knew his secret, Ed would have to do what Mustang told him to do. All the while, though, he helped in the best way he could in leading Ed to places where he can find some answers. He wanted the boy to succeed. He still did. And having Ed in his den telling him everything was some form of secret queue for him to start showing that he cared. If anything, they both needed it.

Mustang could tell that Edward was tired, the circles around his eyes darkened as the hours passed. He yawned in between explanations and fidgeted, turning onto his side, stomach, then back onto his back. His hair was still down and he was lying with it splayed beneath him on the pillow. It had gotten very long and if it weren't for the regular trims Alphonse gave him, his hair would have been past his waist by now. It hung to the middle of his back, now trailing to the edges of the pillow he was resting on, spilling over the sides like tangled clumps of liquid gold, and pooling onto the floor.

_A perfect circle…_ it would make sense that only somebody as perfect as Edward Elric could see a perfect circle in everything. He contained a smirk, knowing the ass kicking he would almost receive if Fullmetal ever heard him say that. He was just so beautiful. So beautiful it hurt to look at him…

"Thank you." They were still staring at each other. Mustang had almost lost himself in those eyes, thinking about the teen and his perfections when Ed spoke.

"Thank you for saving me."

And for the first time that night, and for the day for all Mustang knew, Edward Elric smiled.


	4. Focus Gold-point-0

**I was having a hard time stopping this chapter. As it is plainly obvious, I am taking this story very slowly. Don't worry! It will speed up as it goes on. I am debating whether I should make this an entire story from this point till they get their bodies back or end it soon. My initial plan was to have it last for a long time, but now I'm not sure. Let me know what you think.**

**Hope you enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

_It was dark. Nothing could be seen except for the glowing red liquid on the ground, trailing off into the distance, illuminating what little there was to illuminate. He followed the trail through trees and bushes and paused in a small clearing where the red trail came to an abrupt stop. He looked up and saw thousands of faces staring back at him from within the trees. They were all his face, reflecting off the mirrors in the trees._

_Mirrors?_

_He suddenly realized that the trees were a frosty glass and the leaves were shards of broken mirrors and crystal droplets, faceted like those of a chandelier. The expressions on the faces were lost, afraid, knowing what they would find, afraid of the outcome. They were weary, tired and pale._

_Before he could look back down to the ground and continue his search, the smooth, black ground turned into plastic*****, and moved to swallow him. It stifled his screams as it folded over his body._

_He found himself in a room with bookshelves lining the walls and open books on the floor. There were papers strewn about and it smelled like vomit. In the center of the room was a transmutation circle._

_He knew whose it was._

_He would recognize that style of writing anywhere._

_There was a twisted, malformed body within the circle. It twitched and gasped for air, its black hair wet with the blood it vomited onto the floor._

_He stepped toward it. There was nothing he could to do help it, but he could at least put it out of its misery. He rounded the outside of the circle slowly, afraid of what might happen if he accidently stepped on the lines._

_Its head was pressed into its chest, its grotesque body curled up in what resembled the fetal position somehow. However its body managed to resemble the fetal position, well that must have been difficult._

_He stepped on an open book, cracking the spine, and the body suddenly jerked. It snapped its head up to snarl at him. He yelped and stumbled back, slipping on a pile of paper and landed on his ass._

_The thing in the transmutation circle cried out in pain as it attempted to stand on its wonky legs, failed and fell onto its face. It screamed and bent at a weird angle to then vomit onto the floor. More of the glowing blood came out, as well as something else. It looked like a pile of red and black seaweed._

_The pile of scraggly vomit on the floor began to turn, and he could see within the knotted mess was a face, its golden eyes piercing him through the grass-like strands._

_He turned his body and commenced to crawl toward the face, no longer afraid of the creature next to it. It was no longer moving. He reached into the mess and moved the strands of black, knotted hair from the face._

_"Thank you." They were staring at each other for a while, his eyes like saucers, the face's eyes slightly squinted. He had almost lost himself in those eyes…_

_"Thank you for saving me."_

_That smile…_

* * *

It was a real smile, too, as real a smile can be when one is exhausted due to an impending cold and an oral presentation of the past that lasted several hours, one that managed to burn its way into Mustang's dreams. It was almost terrifying, how something so sincere could seem like something so… well, not.

When Mustang woke, he was still on the floor next to a shivering Fullmetal. The teen was snuggling close, unaware, of course, that the body he was trying to leach heat from was the man he put an obvious show to disliking. It was…

…_how should I say… not cute... Ummm… ironic, maybe? But damn it really_ is_ cute!_

He reached over and touched Edward's face. He was hot. Frowning, he moved to get up, but Fullmetal groaned and grabbed his arm, not letting go.

_Well, damn!_

He had forgotten to get the boy medicine last night when he had planned to. They had fallen asleep on the floor, Edward seeming to just pass out, Mustang while thinking intently about Ed's words. He hummed quietly to himself and fell asleep soon after the teen did. He must have been quite exhausted himself! He wasn't planning on sleeping on the den floor with Ed, but he guessed people don't usually stick to plans like that when completely engrossed in something interesting.

_"Thank you..."_

It was said quietly and followed by one of the most tear-summoning smiles he had ever seen. Not because it was a sad smile. It most definitely was not. It was a smile of true gratitude, a smile of contentment, like the teen had found something he was looking for and found it. Yet behind that smile, even if it wasn't being thought of by the wearer at that exact moment, was a past stained with old blood, agonizing cries and tears that were never allowed to fall. But in the moment the smile was given, a free gift to Mustang, it was genuine.

Mustang was glad for that.

He resigned to remaining on the floor for a little while longer and let Edward pull him back down and crawl half onto him. He chuckled, almost giddy with excitement at the faces Ed was going to make when he woke up realizing his predicament. Edward's body was very warm and it made Mustang sweat being in such close contact with him.

_Maybe it would be best if I wake him now._

Because it was a holiday Tuesday, and if it wasn't going to be he would not have brought the teen home to listen to him till the wee hours of the morning, he decided it wouldn't be too bad to wait for Ed to wake up.

Besides, he sort of liked the feeling of waking up next to somebody.

He didn't sleep around nearly as much as the people of Central thought he did. Most of the "dates" he went on were with informants. On occasion, he would bring a girl home, but never one of his informants.

It felt good, having a warm body, albeit a _very_ warm body, barging in on his personal space. It felt like he had a responsibility to keep that person comfortable, and in that was not allowed to move.

_Haha!_

It wasn't very long before Fullmetal stirred in his sleep and groaned to awareness. He moved a little, turning his head into Mustang's torso to block out the dull light coming in from the window, and then he froze, realizing what he was doing and who he was snuggled up against and he jumped up from his spot on Mustang and moved several feet away.

Mustang croaked out a laugh and sat up. "Well good morning to you, too Fullmetal. Sleep well?"

A low grunt from a glaring teenager that was scratching his messy head was his only response. Ed yawned and turned his head away from the light, pulled on a corner of the blanket he had been using and wrapped it around himself, shivering.

_Medicine. Right._

Simply because he liked to make the kid tick, instead of going straight to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom, he crawled toward Edward slowly, doing a damn good job of ignoring the glare he was receiving and reached out to place his palm against the teen's forehead. He already knew that Ed had a fever, but this was fun.

Edward jerked back at the touch and stared at Mustang with wide eyes, then seemed to relax a little and let the man touch his head.

"You have a fever. I'm sorry for not being responsible enough to get you medicine as soon as I noticed that you weren't feeling well."

Ed pushed Mustang's hand away and sniffled, but didn't say anything. After a few moments, he coughed a few times, obviously trying to make it seem less than it was.

Mustang sighed and got up and went to the bathroom. He decided that since he was already in there, he might as well take a piss and think some more. There was no way he could get all of that out of his mind. Especially that smile.

_"Thank you for saving me…"_

He never expected the boy to ever thank him, let alone even notice that he was helping, but Fullmetal was very sharp, so somehow the idea that he had noticed wasn't surprising.

He washed his hands and returned with the medicine.

Edward had moved from the floor to the couch and was trying to keep as much of him covered with the blanket as possible while leafing through the notes Mustang had left on the coffee table. This time he seemed like he didn't care that he was invading on the older man's privacy and ignored him as he came in. he looked intrigued and frustrated as well and was writing notes in the margins of the papers and sketching arrays to point at what he intended to explain.

For a few minutes, the colonel just watched, enjoying seeing the boy-genius work. It was quite a sight, the intense concentration, almost as though one could see the formulae and arrays panning out in front of the teen's eyes in tiny laser-like projections, his mind using more space than it had to work everything out into something that would only make sense to the Fullmetal Alchemist.

Deciding it didn't matter that the kid had looked into his notes, Mustang stepped closer and handed Edward a small plastic cup filled with orange liquid and a glass of water. Edward didn't take it at first and jerked when he realized there was a hand in front of his face, and then he took the cup and drank the goo, made a face and handed it back to Mustang.

As Edward drank the water in the glass and continued to read and write Mustang's notes and arrays, the colonel went to the kitchen and brewed herbal tea. It was for Edward. He could hear the teen coughing in the den.

Mustang would have coffee.

* * *

Edward attempted to hide his relief when he was handed a large mug of herbal tea. He glanced up at Mustang as he took it, suddenly aware of the man and his stare. Ed blushed and set the papers and notebooks back onto the coffee table. He hadn't intended to be drawn to them again and suddenly felt ashamed of his lack of respect for the older man's privacy.

"Did I make any mistakes?"

Edward flinched and looked up at the colonel who was now seated across from him in the same spot as the previous evening. Edward quickly regained his senses and snorted.

"Plenty," he said, his voice hoarse. "But then, I wouldn't be able to tell when there are symbols that I do not recognize. The arrays without them would be completely flawed, but because they are there, I have no way of telling whether they are correct. However," he pointed at the top paper, "the array for water transmutation right there, to turn water into strings of vapor, thin at a molecular level and to keep them in that form long enough to cut through whatever it is you want to cut through, you would need the symbol for 'ice'. Not because there is any ice involved, but because the ice symbol paired with the symbol for 'heat' would create vapor. You used the symbol for 'thread' and the symbol for 'fire'."

Edward felt pretty pleased that he could critique the older man's work. "With the fire symbol, you would ignite a flame and incinerate the vapor strings because the symbol pairing would never work. Also, the thread symbol would bind the vapor molecules together and they would become useless, flaming strings. I imagine you already thought of that, though, seeing as you had many other pairings and one of the pairing of heat and ice. You scratched it out, though, and I don't know why. The only way to tell is to try it."

He looked up into the intense gaze of the Flame Alchemist.

"What?"

The colonel snickered and sipped his coffee.

_Seriously! What the hell could he be thinking?_

"You really are remarkable," he sighed. "I did think of that, but decided against it because I am nowhere near accustomed to water alchemy. I only decided to look into it because I'm 'useless when wet', to put it the way you said it about a year ago. If I could find a way to put a transmutation circle inside my gloves for water for when it's raining that would be just as effective as my circles for flame, then perhaps I won't be so useless." He stared at Edward, waiting for a reply.

Edward had no idea the man took what he said and turned it into a prod to get him to be more useful… but, perhaps that's not what he meant at all.

"Well, you'll never know if it will work unless you try it," Edward said, suddenly defensive. "And instead of using strings of vapor to cut, why not just clouds of vapor to boil? Either way, whether you are using fire or water vapor, you would be using a similar technique because you'd be cooking your enemies with both types. One to roast, the other to boil. Like bipedal hotdogs!"

Ed was about to say something else when he noticed the look of extreme amusement on Mustang's face. A slow smile was forming as though he was trying to hold in a laugh, then he suddenly guffawed and chuckled. "You're really exploring the fact that I could be using this technique to kill? I use alchemy for other things, you know."

Edward stared at the colonel, suddenly ashamed for suggesting such a thing, not only because he was thinking of effective ways to kill, but assuming that was the objective of the man across from him, therefore making the suggestion to fit to the subject. He was so very embarrassed at the moment he had no response prepared.

"It's okay. I know you didn't mean it that way." Mustang looked like he understood. If anything, he looked more amused than anything.

There was a moment of silence. Edward figured Al might be worried so he thought that he would need to leave soon. It was only about 10am and it was a holiday. He didn't have to be in too much of a hurry to get back, but he didn't want to keep Al waiting. He did enough of that already…

Besides all that, Ed couldn't help thinking about the symbols he didn't understand. He really wanted to know what they meant, his attempts at 'translating' failed miserably, and he really didn't like that. There was no way that he was going to be able to go over everything he would like to with Mustang before the day was over. He was frustrated. He didn't want to ask to come over again, but he didn't want to pass up the opportunity to learn something new. The conflict inside him grew as he contemplated the possibility that he was beginning to develop a higher level of respect for the old bastard than he already did.

He looked up at Mustang and saw that the man was still watching him closely, not exactly meeting his gaze. Ed could see the colonel's eyes flicking over his entire form under the blanket and he suddenly felt naked. He pulled the blanket up around his shoulders and noticed Mustang's eyes move up to Ed's hair. They stayed there.

Ed wasn't completely surprised that Mustang seemed to have a fixation on his hair. He had been complimented on it many times before and told by random people that his hair was the 'richest shade' of blond hair they had ever seen, like it was some kind of 'spun gold'. He never argued, just responded with, "Uh, thanks," and would move on. Almost everywhere he had been there were people that would ask to touch it or would just go ahead and do so without permission. It bothered him, but he was not about to cut his hair no matter how much the people pissed him off. He had promised Al he wouldn't cut his hair until they got their bodies back…

Still looking at the colonel, he thought suddenly that he hadn't given anything to him in exchange for letting him stay the night and for patiently listening to everything he had said. He thought for a moment what he could do for him but came up blank. There wasn't anything he could do for the man that would make up for what Mustang had already done for him. It was a lot and Edward felt completely useless at the moment. _Oh, well…_

"Um… Colonel?"

Mustang's eyes finally flicked up to Ed's face. "Mmmn?"

"Would you like to touch it?"

* * *

***Plastic: by this I mean the actual dictionary definition, a solid that acts as a liquid, not that colored crap that humans make to easily construct just about everything.**


	5. Do You Mind At All?

**I don't know if anybody noticed, because I haven't gotten to far into the story yet (obviously I'm still writing of the occurences within a 24 hour period), but I'm going to be mixing up all of the FMA stories, except Sacred Star of Milos. I never watched that series, mostly because I had already watched the others and read the manga. I'm going to also be changing around the timing and place and when they meet the other characters.**

**If you would just continue to read my fic, well you'd find that out, but I'm warning you because I don't want people saying things like, "You know, Hohenheim never did show up at that time!" or, "That is so not how that character acts!"**

**The plot bunnies are breeding with other species of rabbit over here! You don't even know!**

**Deal with it! It's more like an alternate reality, mash-up story that is so jumbled that I might even get lost in the chaos! I don't know! We'll just have to see what happens! So in the meantime, Just enjoy the story.**

* * *

Edward watched as the colonel stared at him, confused.

_Of course that question would seem so fucking random! And suggestive!_

Even though the colonel _had_ been staring at Ed's hair, there was no way he wouldn't be surprised that Ed had noticed. He would be confused, too, trying to figure out why Ed had come up with a reaction like that.

_"Would you like to touch it?"_

Edward mentally face-palmed himself for saying something so unintentionally, well… kinky? Mustang looked shocked, as though he was having similar thought running through his mind. Edward was feeling a bit nervous, though he did not know why. He hadn't meant it in any other way than the way he said it.

_Now that is just fucking great! It sounded so bad!_

He bit his lip and imagined beams coming from his eyes, twisting at the ends like a drill bit and drilling holes in the colonel's face. He smiled a little at that, suddenly less nervous.

"What?" Mustang didn't seem to think he heard Edward correctly.

"Nothing! I've really got to pee. Do you mind at all?"

Mustang shook his head and waved toward the door as he looked into to empty fireplace.

Ed stood and let the blanket fall to the ground, not caring where it landed, and padded to the bathroom while scratching the back of his head and yawning.

Yep, he really needed to take a piss! He could have sworn that that was the longest lasting stream of urine he had ever witnessed!

When he finished he looked around the small bathroom. It was obvious Mustang rarely used this bathroom. Still, there were things in there that showed evidence that the colonel did use the mirror.

Edward smiled at his reflection. Of course Mustang used the _mirror._ The man would shrivel up from low self-esteem if he had to live without seeing his own face a specific number of times a day, Ed was sure.

Before he turned to leave, his gaze fell to an object on the counter, his nervousness creeping up in him again.

* * *

Roy didn't look up when Fullmetal reentered the room. He was forcing himself to stop thinking dirty thoughts.

_"Would you like to touch it?"_

Of course, Fullmetal had to mean his hair, but the words were just so… _suggestive!_ And he had said it so softly with a slightly amused smile on his face. What was happening!

He finally glanced up when he noticed Fullmetal's presence directly in front of him and was surprised to see a comb in his face. He looked between the comb and the teen's face, which looked slightly amused, but also nervous.

Fullmetal licked his lips and said, "I'm hungry. But before we do anything like eat, could you comb my hair?" he motioned with the comb.

Roy stared up at the teen in shock, but he soon calmed down and turned sideways on the couch and patted the spot directly in front of him.

Edward sat down and handed Mustang the comb over his shoulder. Roy stared at the tangled mess of gold in front of him and then lifted both hands to collect the locks in one mass of frizz on the teens back before picking apart the tangles near the ends with the comb.

Mustang noticed his hands were shaking and sincerely hoped Fullmetal wouldn't. He calmed down quickly enough though, remembering the nervous look on the teen's face when he handed Mustang the comb. The colonel had no reason to be nervous, too.

"Maybe you should take a shower, too. I'm sure it will feel nice to be clean." Edward's hair was incredibly soft, and he sure did have a lot of it. He hadn't even met very many women with this amount of hair.

_I bet they would kill to know his _secret hair formula_! Or what kind of shampoo he uses… Hahaha!_

The teen shrugged. He tilted his head back slightly and closed his eyes and hummed softly to himself as Mustang ran his fingers through the parts he had successfully detangled.

"Mmmn… But the one thing I love more than taking nice, long, steaming showers is _not_ showering at all," he said quietly, moving his head into Mustangs fingers the way a dog presses into the hand that scratches behind its ears.

_…nice, long, steamy showers…? He's really pushing it! Don't think about it, Roy!_

Mustang smiled in amusement as Ed hummed again and continued to speak.

"Besides, I took a shower before I ended up in the rain, like my shower yesterday was just extended to outside in a long rinse. I'm still clean."

"Whatever you say, Fullmetal." He couldn't keep the smile off his face, no matter his efforts.

_Yep! I'm thinking about it!_

He leaned forward slightly and sniffed the back of the teen's head. Edward must have noticed because he sat forward a little. He was right. His hair still smelled like shampoo.

Continuing to comb the knots out of the teen's hair he turned his focus elsewhere.

"You said you had seen the gate 'thrice' but you only described the first two times. When was the third? I'm not exactly pleased that you did it again. It might be harder to keep your secret hidden, not to mention that you should have learned from the first time!"

Fullmetal chuckled. _There is nothing funny about this!_ "Nobody knows about the third time, not even Al, so I think I'm pretty safe from anybody learning about it. Don't worry about it."

"Of course I'm going to worry about it! Did you lose something else this time? What was it?" Mustang couldn't believe it! He had stopped brushing through Ed's hair with the comb and Edward patiently waited for him to continue before he spoke again.

"It was a couple of months ago."

Mustang's eyes widened and he stopped combing Ed's hair again. He grabbed the boy's shoulders and spun him around to face him, glaring at his subordinate, obviously beyond displeased.

"Don't get mad! I'd be dead if I didn't do it!"

Roy didn't exactly have a response, but he continued to plead for answers with his facial expressions.

A sigh came from the teen and he turned back around, scooting closer to Mustang with his back to him. He was practically in the colonel's lap, but Mustang pretended not to notice.

"Could you just keep combing my hair and listen? I'm getting around to it!"

Mustang sighed and gathered the teen's hair together and continued going after the larger knots.

"You know the night when we were in that cabin in the woods and the homunculus Gluttony ate half the shack?" he waited for Mustang's grunted response. "Well, after we kicked your ass outta there…"

"You told me I would only be in the way, but what was the real reason you made me leave?"

Edward made an exasperated sound and looked at the ceiling. "Al and I knew we would be safe from them regardless. The homunculi were under orders not to kill us. At least that's what Envy told me."

"Who is Envy?"

"Another homunculus. He had told me several months ago that Al and I had to be kept alive because we were important sacrifices. We still are, so I'm not worried. We figured they didn't care about your life though, so we sent you away so we could subdue them." He looked forward again. "I knew they couldn't kill me, so we went after Gluttony and he went out of control and ended up swallowing me by accident."

Mustang took a deep breath and stopped combing Ed's hair again. He didn't move for a few minutes as he sat behind Fullmetal, his breath shaking with fury. He focused on controlling his breathing and sighed.

"Just let me finish, okay? Then you can yell at me," Fullmetal turned his head to look at Roy. They were only inches apart. He could see that Edward knew he was concerned and was asking for nothing but patience. "Please?"

Roy dropped his head onto the teens shoulder and took a deep, steadying breath, then sat straight again and continued to pick at the teen's hair when he turned back around.

"I yelled while I was in there. There was no echo, which freaked me out. The place was huge! Anyway, to make a long story short, I found Ling. He had a torch with fire on it, you know, the fire Gluttony swallowed when you made it? I'm kinda glad he did that, otherwise I wouldn't be able to see. Anyways, Ling and I ran around trying to find an edge. We soon discovered that the space went on forever. We were ankle deep in blood and I used alchemy to create a hole in the 'ground'. We dropped a torch down it and watched and listened for it to hit the bottom, but no sound ever came up. It was pretty creepy.

"We eventually stopped running around. It was pretty gross, since we were practically swimming in blood. We were covered in it.

"Eventually we were found by Envy. Apparently, Envy had tried to grab me from getting swallowed by Gluttony and ended up getting eaten as well. We ended up fighting. He said we were going to die in there anyways, so there was no point in caring whether I was alive or not. He turned into this huge, green monster, thingy with faces and entwining bodies all over him. It was gross! And he beat the hell outta me. It hurt a lot, and he ended up breaking my arm. I had given up because I thought we were gonna just die there, too, so I laid there on the ground and he ate me.

"It was so, super gross, the way he did it, too! I was lying there, on a piece of some ruins from hundreds of years ago and he stood over me and these slimy hands and limbs poured out of his mouth and picked me up and wrapped around me, and they slowly pulled me into his mouth and I was pulled into a place full of bodies and twisted flesh." He shuddered and made a gagging noise. It sure as hell didn't sound like a nice tea party to Roy, either, but he ignored the urge to ask and kept his attention on Edward's hair.

"While I was in there, I looked over to my left, which was hard because of the tightness of the space, and I saw his Philosopher's Stone connected to his insides and I got an idea. I whispered to Envy, I knew he could hear me… I told him the idea and he just spit me up. Even grosser than being eaten! Anyway, I drew a human transmutation circle that I saw on part of the ruins in Xerxes and part of the Xerxes ruins inside Gluttony, used the stone inside Envy and transmuted myself to get us out of there.

"We ended up spilling out of poor Gluttony, seriously, he was crying when we came out. He was covered in blood from where we came out, but then he started apologizing for eating me and kept crying. For a complete freak, he actually is quite sweet. He just hates you because you killed Lust. They were really close from what I gathered."

He paused, noticing that Mustang had, once again, stopped combing his hair. Mustang sighed and continued. They were silent until the colonel had managed to get out all of the tangles and knots, then ran his fingers through the golden tresses.

His face was screwed up with several emotions. He didn't know what to feel at the moment. He was angry that Edward had to transmute himself to save himself and his companions, he was frustrated that he couldn't come up with a response, he was sad that the teen's life was so completely messed up and he wanted to fix it. He was also quite amused at the descriptiveness of Edward's explanation of being eaten by Envy, but he was angry it happened.

He leaned forward and pressed his face to the back of Edward's head. The teen's body stiffened, but was quick to relax. They sat there silently until Edward shifted and turned to face the colonel.

They were so close! Mustang could feel Edward's breath on his lips. Ed seemed to understand the look on the colonel's face because he smiled softly and rested his head on Mustang's shoulder. The way Edward had shifted had placed the teen right into Mustang's lap and he wrapped his arms around the teen, squeezing their bodies together. He closed his eyes and pressed his lips together, trying to relax.

"Then what happened?" he asked, not exactly wanting to know anymore. He quickly regretted asking, though because Edward pulled back and looked at him. He made no move to get off Mustang's lap, though.

"Not much," he shrugged. "We came out of Gluttony in a place directly underground of Central HQ and met the guy the homunculi call their father. It was pretty creepy, how much he looked like my dad. He looked exactly like him actually, and we thought he was him until he asked us if we knew Hohenheim when we mentioned his name. We told him we were his sons and he seemed to think it was interesting. He told me that he needed me healthy and alive to be a good sacrifice and touched my arm. It healed in seconds.

"Then Scar came in through some door with a little girl that kept calling him 'Mr. Scar', and she yelled at me for toying with her heart, which I didn't understand at all because I had never seen her before.

"Anyway, I'm safe, I'm here, and it doesn't matter anymore. Please don't kill me for it. I only did it to get us out of there." He looked very apologetic, and Mustang knew Edward would never let words such as 'I'm sorry' leave his mouth.

"Oh, and the Father Guy said that you were going to be a sacrifice as well, so you are also safe from the homunculi, though maybe not Gluttony, because he really wants to kill you."

"I'm a sacrifice? What does that mean?"

"I have no fucking clue, but if it means that they won't kill us for the time being, then I'm willing to be content with it for now. Besides, the Father Guy said that he wouldn't need us as sacrifices till next spring, on 'the promised day'. Whatever the hell that means. All in all, it means we are safe for another eleven months or so and in the meantime, we can come up with a way to not let it happen."

Mustang bit his cheeks. "You knew about the homunculi and about me being a sacrifice and you didn't tell me?" he glared at the teen.

"I'm telling you now," Edward responded and inhaled sharply, letting his breath out through his nose. Was it just Mustang, or was Fullmetal's breath sounding shaky? There was also a faint blush spreading across the teen's cheeks and he fidgeted in Mustang's lap.

Roy sighed and looked away then back to the young alchemist in his lap, no longer angry. Fullmetal was right. He was safe and he was here. It did matter, but as long as he was safe…

His breath caught in his throat when he noticed that Edward's face was quite red. He furrowed his eyebrows together and then a smile broke out on his face.

He leaned forward the three inches between their faces and placed a tiny kiss on the teen's nose. He chuckled as the Edward flinched, his eyes wide as he turned his face and scooted to the other side of the couch, obviously embarrassed.

Mustang stood and stretched. It was now somewhere between 10:40 and 11am. "Let's go get some breakfast before you consume yourself from the inside out, oh Walking Stomach!"

Edward made a growling sound from the couch and stood as well, moving to get his clothes. Mustang smiled widely as he walked to his bedroom to change, leaving the blankets and pillows on the floor of the den.


	6. Interesting Day

**Guest: No, Edward isn't only embarrassed to be in Mustang's lap. He sat there on purpose, but he was afraid to do it. The kiss just set him off.**

**RubySapphireMoon: Of course. I don't think I would want to be in his presence if he didn't have them in convenient places.**

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**Yay! Chapter six up!**

**I have been so out of it. I was having a hard time writing because I hit a wheel of cheese… Wheel of cheese? I meant roadblock. Yeah… that's it…**

**Please enjoy! This has got to be the ***** chapter I've written so far. Seriously, I think my writing skill has gone down…but I'll work towards getting better. I have the masses to entertain!**

**Longest chapter so far… I try to keep them between 2000 and 3000 words… this one exceeded it. Oh well…**

**Comment, favorite, enjoy!**

* * *

Edward sighed and leaned his head back onto the wall. He was frustrated. Of course, anyone would be… he didn't know what was wrong with him, but he did know that if Mustang found out he would never hear the end of it. It was the second time that holiday Tuesday that he had had to do this, to run to the bathroom and relieve himself of the uncomfortable ache in his pants, something that wasn't anything new to him, but it was definitely embarrassing, especially regarding the situation.

He relaxed there on the seat of the toilet quietly praying to no one that it wouldn't happen again and that Mustang wouldn't notice before slowly sitting upright and moving toward the sink to wash the wetness from his hands.

There was a light knock at the door.

"Fullmetal, are you alright?"

He froze for a moment before responding weakly.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just… not feeling well, I guess."

"Alright, well, I made some tea, so come have some when you feel well enough to leave the bathroom."

"Okay."

It was a good five minutes before he exited the bathroom and entered the kitchen where he sat at the counter and watched as the colonel went about pouring the tea. Mustang handed Ed a mug and sat next to him, placed his cheek on a fist and stared at him. The colonel didn't move for several minutes except to take a sip of his steaming tea. Edward didn't know what to do, so he just stared back and sipped his tea as well.

For some reason he didn't know, it didn't feel awkward or strange the way they stared at each other. It definitely didn't feel intimate, either, but it wasn't uncomfortable.

They sat like that until the tea was gone. There was music playing from the den where a gramophone sat atop a large oak dresser-looking-thing. It wasn't loud, but Ed had a feeling that if it wasn't playing, the quiet in the kitchen would definitely have been strange and uncomfortable.

It was almost as if they weren't even looking at each other anymore. Ed could clearly see Mustang's face, but he was thinking about other things, some of those things involving the colonel himself and because of that, he wasn't really looking at the colonel's features.

It was weird, not because of the quiet and staring, but because they had spent almost the entire day together. It was now 6pm and Edward wondered in his head how he managed to spend over 24 hours with the man without finding something to fight about, let alone having two 'accidents' he was NOT going to overlook. He had a nagging suspicion that the colonel might already know what happened, but the both of them kept their mouths shut, Edward in the hopes that the colonel really couldn't know.

After breakfast, which they had at a small diner at Ed's request, the two of them stopped by Edward's dorm room. Ed had thought that he was being dropped off, but the colonel insisted that he get a change of clothes and accompany him to a museum. He had said that of course, Al may come as he wished as well, but Al froze and stared at the colonel for a moment before declining.

_Whatever that was about…_

Al handed Edward some clothes that he never wore, mostly because they were too… well, Al. They were nice and casual, nothing too fancy, but it just wasn't Edward's style. He argued with Al briefly, but, just like their sparring matches, Al always won. Plus, all of Ed's clothes were dirty and Al didn't want to have him in the presence of his commanding officer on holiday smelling like 'a dirty sock heap'.

The clothing consisted of a grey t-shirt with black trim, dark blue low rise jeans, no belt, a soft, black, wool jacket with two rows of buttons on the front and a bright red scarf. Al had even made him wear different shoes, so he decided on his black sneakers. They had red stripes on the sides.

If anything, Ed not only looked nice, but he looked _chic_ as well, a word Al had said when appraising the pissed blond. Wasn't chic what fashion freaks call the clothing they wear that looks… who knows, celebrity-like? Which was somewhat fitting, given that Edward was something of a celebrity, being the alchemist of the people and all that.

He had said that he hated the outfit, but really, he thought he looked good, almost like a normal teenager.

He left his hair down and brushed the colonel off when the man complimented his outfit, pretending not to care what the older man thought. He had kept walking, only slightly ahead so as to cover the faint blush the compliment had painted onto him and kept quiet till it dissipated.

They spent close to three hours at the museum. It was an art museum. Ed supposed that the colonel knew he viewed alchemy and the arrays to do it with as art, for he was sure Mustang thought of it the same way, but he guessed the man wanted to show him what 'normal' people considered art. Mustang had said that he wanted to introduce these forms of art to Edward, that maybe Edward himself might just want to try doing it some time.

And he did. As soon as he got his hands on the materials he was going to try to create something that could go into an art museum, something that would _move_ anybody, that would have his mark on it, his meaning, and it would make people want to sing…

He was getting too carried away with the passion the paintings and sculptures and even the architecture of the building itself awakened in him.

He had a goal. He would return his brother's body to the state it was originally. Then he could think about art.

Until then…

Ed and Mustang talked about what they had seen afterword and continued to do so through dinner, which Mustang again treated to him, but at a restaurant, not a diner or café.

And now here they were, simply sitting in each other's presence, enjoying it, enjoying each other.

Ed didn't know how to proceed from there. He felt that if he spoke it would interrupt the moment and he would have to go back to whatever…

He set his mug down, scooted his stool closer to Mustang so that his automail knee was between the man's legs and Mustang's leg was between his as well. He took no action from there, just continued to stare at the colonel, feeling the moment. This closeness, this attention, this comfort… they were things he craved, and from what he'd seen of Mustang over the last twenty-four hours, he was sure the man was more than willing to give it.

When his mother died, all he had was Al and they would sleep together at night, comfort each other whenever they felt down, which was a lot. But ever since Al's soul was transferred to the armor, Edward had craved physical touch from somebody warm, from anybody…

He was seventeen now. He was an adult, right? He can make his own decisions, he can share his need with somebody else, right?

His euphoria was interrupted as Mustang lifted his hand and brushed a stray lock of hair from Ed's face. He brushed it over Edward's ear and patted Ed's cheek.

Ed closed his eyes. It felt good… _real good…_ to have somebody touch him. He leaned into the colonel's palm and sighed, not realizing that he had just put a smile on the man's face.

He knew that from now on their relationship was going to be worlds different. It was going to be better.

Warm breath wafted against his face before the colonel placed a gentle kiss upon the teen's forehead. Edward wasn't expecting that. He had lost himself in the touch of the colonel's hand and opened his eyes, surprised. Mustang's lips did not leave his head for a good minute and Ed allowed himself to relax into the man's contact as he lifted his flesh hand to cover Mustang's and push it closer to his face.

It was over all too soon. Mustang pulled back, not far, and gifted Edward with a soft smile. Ed smiled back and the lowered their hands between them. Mustang began to pick at Edward's hair with his free hand and brushing it between his fingers, straightening it out. Edward closed his eyes again, enjoying the touch. It just felt _sooo_ good!

"I should take you home." It was a whisper that sounded somewhat sad and Edward silently fantasized that the sadness was for the fact that they were going to soon be apart.

Much different a thought than what was going through his mind a week earlier when all he wanted was to be out of the colonel's office and back in the library.

He opened his eyes and met the colonel's dark stare.

"Yeah, I think so… Al will worry if I end up spending another night with you, and he'll wonder, too." He said that last bit with raised eyebrows. He knew the colonel understood what he meant.

There. They agreed that he should go home. So why weren't they moving? Edward was very reluctant to move at all, he didn't want the touch to end so quickly, even if it had been a good ten minutes.

Apparently the colonel was thinking the same thing because he pressed their foreheads together and whispered, "You don't have to go." And bit his lip.

Edward didn't want to go either. He licked his lips and pushed his forehead gently into Mustang's.

"The holiday is over, Mustang." He pleaded inside. He wanted to be held, to be touched.

"Not yet, it isn't." Mustang slowly closed the gap between them, pausing briefly when Ed felt their lips brush lightly together, but he started when Mustang pulled away, exhaling shakily.

Ed blinked a few times, wondering about what had almost just happened.

He watched Mustang as the man nervously carded his fingers through his hair and felt his face heat up. He blinked a few more times and looked down, suddenly trying to hide his face with his hair, to hide the blush that was swirling up onto his cheeks.

He heard the colonel chuckle and looked up to see a soothing smile on the man's face.

"Come on," Mustang said and took Ed's automail hand and stepped off his stool. Edward's blush didn't seem to have any intention of leaving anytime soon, in fact it deepened, so he hopped off of his stool as well and followed the colonel to the den.

* * *

It was, once again, that time of night when one would be preparing to go to sleep. Almost 10pm and Edward had been suckered into spending more time in the den with Mustang going over notes, coming up with more and bantering pleasantly about alchemic theory and life together.

Suckered isn't the word… _persuaded_ was definitely much better.

Roy didn't exactly want to admit to himself that what he really wanted was to have some companionship. He was used to being alone, but spending a national holiday with somebody, even if said holiday was one that was boring as fuck, made some days seem more livable. Not that he wanted to off himself or anything. Those days were over and replaced with his journey forward, to make this country a better place for the people that live within it.

Of course, he never would have thought that he would be spending it with anybody, not even the sleepy looking teen sitting next to him on the floor.

Yes, they had once again migrated to the floor to better spread out the papers and experiment.

Mustang had carefully watched Edward ever since the small incident in the kitchen. Ed had visited the bathroom looking flushed for the third time that day about ten minutes after they had reentered the den, something that made Roy chuckle. He had a suspicion that Ed had been wanking in the bathroom, but he decided to save the teen some embarrassment and wasn't going to ask him.

Could it be that the teen had a crush on him? Not that he was going to exploit it. Almost kissing him in the kitchen was much more than he had intended in the first place. What he really wanted to do was comfort the teen, but in all truth, he didn't really know how. He had never really been in a position to comfort somebody he cared for.

But then again, he felt that the time they spent together the whole day helped more than a hug could.

Perhaps he was filling an empty spot within the teen that was left broken when his father left. Sure, Edward said that it was because of how his mother reacted to their father being missing that he hated the man, but he could tell it hurt him as well.

Unfortunately, though, the night was getting late and Roy had work in the morning. Not that he minded being late, but Hawkeye would have his head if he did.

Not that he really cared.

He entrusted his life to the woman, and if ever he strayed from his path she was under direct order to shoot and kill him. He knew that she wouldn't anyway, no matter what he did.

Edward had been a little fidgety when he came back from the bathroom and had avoided direct contact with Mustang for the first hour, but as they got into things that seemed to distract him from his thoughts for anything blush-worthy, he seemed to forget and he let physical contact happen.

At the moment, they were sitting next to each other, basking in their afterglow of having completed a very complicated formula and array, a feeling only an alchemist can compare to sex. Their arms were touching and they were leaning against the couch, having moved the coffee table hours ago.

Neither of them said anything for a while. They let the moment die down till it was no longer warm with alchemic excitement and a nervous chill crept into the room.

Roy looked down at Edward and noticed that, once again, there was a faint blush on the teen's face. He wondered about the meaning behind it, but wouldn't dare ask. No doubt Edward would tell him, but he wasn't sure he even wanted to know.

After taking in the sight and moving slightly away, he ran a hand through his hair and looked back at Edward, surprised to see tears in the teen's eyes.

_What the..?_

He froze. What the hell was he supposed to do anyway? The teen had gone over some pretty emotional stuff the night before, so why was he crying now?

He quickly stumbled over what to do in his head and settled on putting an arm around the teen. He leaned in close, pulled Edward closer with his arm and opened his mouth to say something, anything that would make the demons within Ed go away…

…only he had nothing. He had no idea what was going on in the teen's head. He furrowed his brows together and shut his mouth, deciding that if Edward wanted to tell him why he was crying, he would listen.

Again, the colonel reminded himself that he had no idea how to comfort another person, he'd never had to, but he did remember that when you are confronted with comforting a rape victim, you don't say anything to them, just listen. This was similar right?

_Ugh! Ew! No!_

* * *

But Edward didn't say anything. He buried his face in Roy's shoulder and sobbed until the colonel's shirt was stained darker than the rest in one area with tears. He clutched tightly to the older man's sides as he pushed his face harder into Mustang's neck, causing the area to become sticky.

Several minutes passed and Edward's sobs had become muffled whimpers, then it was quiet for some time before he pushed himself away from Mustang, frantically scrubbing at his face and sniffling and muttering apologies, cleverly doing so without the use of the word sorry, for his uncontrollable cry-session.

Mustang assured him it was alright and after sitting next to him for a few more minutes, got up and pulled the disheveled teen to his feet and led him to the bathroom to wash his face.

While Edward was in the bathroom washing up, Mustang sauntered off to the end of the hall to his room to change his shirt. He sighed as he sat down onto the edge of his bed and ran his hands over his face.

_What an interesting day…_

He rejoined the teen in the den and they made to leave to take Edward back to his dorm. The sun had gone down a couple of hours earlier and the walk was quiet. It wasn't until they had already entered the military dormitory building and stepped in front of the door that Edward said anything.

"Can we…" Edward started, clearly nervous and worried. "Can we do this again? Hang out I mean, and talk about science and stuff..?" He looked up at the colonel, his face hopeful.

There was a moment of silence while the two of them looked at each other.

"I mean, I still hate you, you bastard!"

Mustang chuckled at the embarrassed look on Edward's face.

"Of course we can, and don't worry. I still think you're a brat."

"Said the incompetent bastard pervert with a god complex!"

"I'm glad to see you're yourself. I was beginning to worry. I would have had to admit you to a psych ward for a _short_ visit." This was good. Their relationship wasn't going to change, and that was very good indeed.

"Well… I'm gonna go to bed now, so… thanks for listening to me. I was really… nothing! Thanks!" Edward said quickly and turned toward the door.

Mustang reached out a hand and felt the teen's shoulder stiffen at his touch. "I'll see you in the morning and don't forget your report. Hakuro isn't too happy about the wait."

Ed turned to peer up at him.

"Okay." There wasn't anything else to say, so they said goodnight and Roy left the building and returned to his home after making sure Edward had closed the door all the way before turning away.

_Yes. Today was a very interesting day…_

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**Did anybody notice in the last chapter that I called you guys my Cheshires? Yeah, goes with my name of being Alice. I love Cheshire!**

**I promise to pick the story up a little more. I suppose I get too detailed when it comes to the emotional and intimate chunks. But hey! Detail is my specialty!**

**If you have any suggestions, I would be happy to write for you! Please leave them in the review box or section thingy or whatever it is called, and I will do my best to respond and comply with your wishes.**

**Thank you for being awesome!**

**Love you, my Cheshires!**

**Alice, out!**


	7. Friends or Family

**I don't exactly remember when it was that I updated, but it couldn't have been that long ago... right?**

**Hope this makes you guys happy. I can tell you guys are getting a little antsy...**

**Seeker Heart: I honestly thought that the last chapter was the worst one I wrote so far. I"m glad you liked it despite what I thought. XD Always pleased to have my thoughts contradicted!**

**MachiavellissmX: And here you are, then!**

**joruni: I suppose everybody is, huh?**

**guest: I am not really sure if you guests to the sight actually follow the stories, but I'm pleased to see that you have read it none the less. Understandably, it would make sense that their relationship isn't totally platonic, and it won't be much more so after this chapter, but I want them to be more friends for now than lovers. Even if they've brushed lips and Roy is aware, Ed isn't aware that he knows... Not yet XD**

**Now to get on with the story!**

* * *

Al watched as his brother entered the small dorm and greeted him as he came in. Edward stopped, their eyes met and the both of them paused, but he did not return the greeting. He stared quietly at Al for a moment and then turned to his bed, took off his clothes, exchanged his t-shirt for a tank top and slid into his bed.

Alphonse watched, but didn't ask anything, knowing that if Edward wanted to tell him, he would open his ungodly mouth and spray it at him, complete with profanities.

When he was sure that Edward was asleep, he picked his brother's clothes up off the floor and made a mental note to buy him some more just like them. He thought his brother looked amazingly chic in them and was hoping to someday impress it on his brother that chic was good.

Afterwards, he settled onto the bed across the sleeping form of the Fullmetal Alchemist and read some of the books they still hadn't returned to the library, making notes here and there and bookmarking all of the spots Ed would have to get to later.

When morning came, Al settled on trying to wake Ed in an entirely new way and tilted the bed up from the head to see how long it would take his brother to realize he was going to slide to the foot of the bed and fall.

A crazed blond creature flew through the air and effectively _whumped_ onto the face of Al's helmet before he managed to get the bed more than two feet off of the floor. Al lost his grip on the bed which crashed to the floor as he fell backwards, almost knocking his head against the wall between the beds.

Edward jumped off of him and stepped back to stare at his younger brother incredulously.

"I fucking swear, Al! Your amusement in waking me up only ends in me less and less so reluctantly plotting your slow and painful demise once we get your body back." He then turned abruptly and sauntered into the bathroom.

Al laughed as he watched him go. He noted the hoarseness in Ed's voice when he spoke and saved his 'I knew it!' for later.

Of course he would have a cold!

Whatever... As if Ed cared anyway.

Before the both of them left, Ed holed himself up in the bathroom for a half hour. Al assumed it was because he didn't want to see the colonel again after spending so much time with him the last couple days. Putting off going in to the office wasn't anything new, but Al knew it was a little different this time.

It had to be.

As soon as Ed exited the bathroom, Al shoved Ed's overdue report into his brother's hands and pushed him out the door, not caring what strange sounds only Ed was capable of making left his mouth.

It didn't take them very long to get to the office, seeing as the dorm buildings were only across the large courtyard. Really, any excuse any person that lived in the dorms had for being late would normally be considered completely invalid due to their closeness to the offices and training grounds. There simply wasn't anything that could make them late save for their own laziness.

Of course, Edward was a special case, and all the other soldiers noticed. They grumbled amongst themselves often about it but none of them would dare complain to their superior officers. It would only get them in trouble themselves, not only with them, but with Mustang as well when the other officers confronted him about it.

To them, there was something strange about his leniency toward the young prodigy, to others, they understood, remembering themselves what it was like to be a child, and no child would do well with a strict military setting.

Ed and Al entered Mustang's office a little after eleven. It was nearing lunch and Al understood that Ed figured that if he came in at this time, the others as well as the colonel would head out to lunch soon and his oral report would have to be cut short. He could then go to the library and spend the rest of the day in there until closing time, or maybe even afterwards. Who knows…

The man looked up from his paperwork with a smirk, doing well to conceal his small bit of joy at having a break from said work.

"How good of you to arrive just on time, Fullmetal! I was just thinking about betting on the time you would be in today with the others!" he said cheerily and Edward scowled at him as the brothers entered.

Instead of replying, Edward tomahawked his enveloped report at Mustang, who jumped back and barely stifled a yelp as it hit him in the chest, which had him fumbling it so it wouldn't fall to the floor.

Al expertly hid his smile… because it was impossible to show it anyways.

"Brother! That was rude!" Sometimes he was glad he didn't have a face to express with, otherwise, nobody would think he was as sweet as he led everybody to believe. Sometimes he thought he might have convinced Edward as well, but he knew better. Ed knew he was a brat.

"That bastard had it coming! Looking all happy this early in the morning…" he then plopped himself onto the leather couch.

It wasn't the office Edward Elric frequented, it was the couch.

_Hahahahahahahaha! Al liked that one very much. He'd have to say that to somebody that knew them well enough to get it._

"Early? 11am is early? Learn to go to bed earlier and this would be considered mid-morning." Colonel Mustang chided from behind his desk where he must have tried to convince himself he was safe.

"If you really had the reasons everybody thinks you do to stay up till the wee hours of the morning exhausting your-pompous-self, you would agree with me and think 11 _is_ early!" Edward wasted to time with his retort, and Al could see that to everybody, things must be back to normal.

He excused himself quietly after hearing the two bicker for a few minutes, deciding it wasn't something he wanted to hear. It always gave him the closest thing to a headache as anything could and he never stayed for long.

* * *

Ed pretended not to notice as Al left the room, quietly shutting the door behind him. As if on cue, both he and Mustang stopped their arguing and stared at each other. It seemed that neither of them knew how to go on until the older man stood from his glorious throne-Ed rolled his eyes-and made his way to the teen.

They stood for a few moments and then Mustang moved to the other couch and sat.

It seemed to be something of a new theme. They would be quiet, then they would sit across from each other, and then the talking would commence.

Edward took this as cue to sit, which he did in his normal spot on the couch across from the god of all things annoying.

"You haven't a clue as to how many questions I have, Fullmetal," Mustang began. He looked hard at Edward who fidgeted and cursed himself for it.

"But let's start with your report." The colonel pulled the forms out of the manila envelope and gave them a quick once-over before setting them down on the coffee table before him and waiting.

"Right, um… When we first arrived…" Edward began, knowing just how much he should admit, which was considerably less than what he would omit, but it didn't matter. The bastard seemed to have eyes and ears everywhere. He'd learn of the rest of it within a day of Edward's return, and somehow, Ed was sure that the man already knew. But he didn't care. He was just going to do what he always did, and that was report and leave.

When he was finished, he looked up to see that he was still being studied with that hard gaze the colonel had been giving him ever since Al left the room.

"I would hope that, given the last couple of days and their events, not to mention the things we talked about, would give you an idea that we, whether you like it or not, have become close. Edward, I know you trust me, otherwise you would never have told me what you did. You would never have cried in my presence." He paused before saying more.

"I want you to know that I am aware that you leveled a good chunk of Burmith before you returned here, and I am also aware that you broke the dam, which would have put the entire city into devastation due to lack of a regular water source had you not had the foresight and fixed it." There was another pause as the colonel pressed his lips together and squinted a little. "Why do you not put these details in your report? Why don't you tell me when you give your oral reports?"

Edward had looked away. Why didn't he? He wasn't sure himself. It couldn't be because he was afraid of getting into trouble. He couldn't care less. As if Mustang could ever do anything to him that he couldn't easily escape and it's not like he didn't like fighting with the guy.

"Hell if I know or care," he quickly stated to make up for the second or two he was thinking about it. "But I have a question for you."

The colonel lifted his hand, palm-up to show he was ready.

Edward didn't know really what he wanted to ask, but he figured he should get one thing straight.

"You almost kissed me." There, he said it. It had been weighing on his mind the entire day before a before he fell asleep to drift through dreams riddled with blood and pain, including a set of alluring, dark eyes.

He looked up at Mustang. The man looked startled, but he was quick to school his features and prop his chin onto his fist as he turned his head toward the window.

"I don't really know, but I didn't, so there isn't anything to talk about." He flicked his eyes to the blond in front of him with his almost-ever-present smirk slowly forming into something predatory. "Unless you wanted me to..?"

"As if, you bastard! I just…" Edward didn't know how to continue. He could feel his face heating up, but if he ignored it, maybe Colonel Pervert wouldn't notice.

Nope. The man obviously noticed, otherwise his smirk wouldn't have widened.

"I was feeling comfortable that you were being so nice to me and… I don't get that often." Ed said after looking down at his hands. "I mean, when Al's body was taken, I haven't had a warm body to…" He furrowed his brows together. What was the word he was looking for here? Cuddle? Snuggle? That sounded way too childish…

"Sleep with?" Mustang finished for him and he looked up, surprised. "Look, Ed, I understand that you haven't been able to hug anybody or snuggle with anybody since then. I'm not suggesting that I would like to be the person you can snuggle with and whatnot, but if you ever need a hug, I'll gladly give it. I do care about you."

To that, Edward immediately stood and rounded the coffee table. He dropped himself onto the couch next to Mustang and leaned into him and pressed himself into the older man's side, and he felt an arm encircle his shoulders.

"So… you don't have some weird desire to kiss me?" he asked as he peered up at the colonel, not understanding why the idea didn't bother him at all.

Mustang chuckled and ran the hand that wasn't around Edward across his face and smiled down at the teen.

Ed lifted his brows, trying to decipher the colonel's reaction. He almost seemed… nervous. It wouldn't matter. Ed was nervous as well, but he wasn't the one who shouldn't be. He smiled in response.

"I honestly don't know what I was thinking, Ed." He said, to which Edward couldn't help but feel confused at the disappointment welling up in him. He bit his lip and looked down.

It was quiet for a moment. The both of them flinched as the door opened and Hawkeye strode in. She stopped dead in her tracks as she saw the two of them on the couch.

Ed stiffened, but felt Mustang's hand grip his shoulder and he relaxed, understanding that this looked like nothing more than him being 'given manly guidence'.

"I'm sorry, sir. I'll just leave these here and keep anybody from entering until otherwise told." She set a couple of folders onto the coffee table and turned on her heel to leave. She turned back before she reached the door. "Don't use this as an excuse to keep from your work for long, sir."

The both of them watched her shut the door. Edward felt a little awkward that she had seen the two of them on the couch together, but he was sure she would understand what was going on before any of the others would.

He looked back up at Mustang who was gazing thoughtfully at him. He could tell his face must have been pink because Mustang gave him an amused smile before looking away.

"Does this mean we are friends? Or something like it?" Ed asked, still looking at the colonel's profile.

The man looked back.

"I don't know, Ed. Are we friends, or are we family?"

At the mention of family Edward's heart swelled up and he grinned.

"And about me almost kissing you, I really don't know why I was about to, but I know better than to. I don't know if you do, but we aren't exactly something that would be smiled upon by many people. I would hope you understand that."

Edward frowned and nodded then looked down and took a deep breath. He guessed it didn't matter. He had placed himself onto the man's lap the morning before because he was curious to figure out what he was feeling himself. He had been having thoughts about certain people, and all of them men, for a couple of years now and it was hard for him to proceed from where he was at.

If he couldn't get a simple kiss out of a supposed straight man, then he was probably hopeless in figuring out what it was he wanted from the men that plagued his thoughts and dreams.

He felt a gloved hand touch his cheek and he looked up.

Mustang tilted his head to the side and studied Edward's face for a moment before closing the distance between them.

Edward didn't expect to be kissed so soon after being rejected, but he wasn't going to complain as he eagerly returned it. He pressed his flesh hand into Mustang's chest and clutched the starchy fabric of the man's uniform.

They parted and Edward lifted his hand from the tangle on Mustang's chest to his lips and he smiled behind his fingers.

"So you did have some freakish desire to kiss me, you pervert!" he accused and watched with amusement as Mustang screwed his face up and pushed Ed away from him on the couch.

"Get the hell out of my office, shrimp!" he stood and seated himself back into his desk chair as seen by an amused Edward, who couldn't get the smile off of his face, even at the insult.

Mustang was smiling, too, so Edward knew he was in the clear.

For now…

He stood and did his best to glare at the colonel and yelled, "WHO THE HELL ARE YOU CALLING SO DAMN SMALL…"

* * *

The occupants of the outer office were so used to Ed's outbursts that they no longer steeled themselves for them, and when they happened, they no longer flinched. Edward ranted for a minute before storming from the office and only Hawkeye was able to see that there was indeed a smile on his face and that he wasn't angry at all.

She smiled as she focused once again on the work in front of her and the others in the room snickered and clapped hands and bumped fists with each other.

They were finally bonding like they should have years ago.

* * *

**Let me know how this fares for you! I can't wait!**

**Alice out!**


	8. Hormones

**Okay. I haven't updated this in about five months. I hope none of you are gearing up to murder me...**

**I wanted to have several chapters done before I updated so I could have a steady stream of chapters going up on a schedule, but life got so busy I haven't even been able to do that.**

**Please enjoy.**

* * *

The colonel sat at his desk, fingers linked before his lips and eyes trained on the grain of his desk.

He himself didn't even know why he had kissed Edward. It could have been his curiosity. He had been curious for a while, but now he just felt foolish. He would have to make sure that something like that didn't happen again. It was important that they maintain something of a platonic relationship, because, if they could not, some undesirable measures would have to be taken.

He hoped Edward would understand this. Edward should understand. The both of them had goals, and the both of them were working fervently towards those goals. Each step closer to one goal was a step closer to the other, because really, their goals, though very different, were linked.

As much as he would love to explore that area of any sort of relationship with the teen, he would have to be more careful, both for his reputation and Edward's well-being. He wanted to know Edward, to understand him, and he would die before letting an alchemist of Fullmetal's caliber slip through his fingers without some conversation and insight into how to improve his own alchemical research.

There was just no fucking way!

But now he knew that Edward had a crush on him, and in light of that, he would have to tread lightly and carefully.

He had already fucked up with the kiss, but it's not like he didn't want to.

Mustang smiled behind his fingers.

Damn Fullmetal for being so beautiful.

Damn the brat for being so _cute_!

Temporarily dismissing Edward from his mind as he had from his office, Roy resumed his paperwork.

* * *

Edward grinned as he turned the corner to the cafeteria. The seventeen year old felt that life wasn't going to be so frustrating anymore because his biggest antagonist was going to be mellowing down a bit, at least that is what he hoped.

At least they understood each other now.

And he hadn't asked anything of Mustang! He had questions, too..!

So the next time they end up spending time together, he planned to know about the other man's troubles, that they might even be able to share their common pain and console each other in ways that didn't include going over each other's alchemy notes and theories-as much as he would love that anyway. It wouldn't include trips to museums or expensive cafes…

…or clothing.

That thought caught Edward off guard and he shook his head to clear the hormone induced fuzziness and the possible redness from his face. He barely managed to catch himself before charging head-first into a blue uniform.

He jumped back, wide-eyed and a little off balance due to the vigorous head-shaking, and gaped at the handsome older man in front of him. He looked to be in his thirties and had the stars of a lieutenant colonel on his shoulders, but his rank, Edward failed to notice.

"Oh! Excuse me, young man. You should be more careful in these halls, Major Elric."

The man's voice was rich and he didn't seem in the least bit irritated at Ed's distractedness.

"Uh, it's fine." Ed mentally face-palmed for coming up with such a stupid response, but he was at a blank at the moment, mentally incinerating that hideous uniform off of the attractive older male's tall and well-built frame.

_Of course, it makes sense that the military was brimming with attractive, well-built men…_

And then the information sank in.

"You know who I am? Have we met?"

Ed felt so stupid that he couldn't recall a name…

…and that he kept coming up with the worst one liners.

"No, we have not. But, yes, I know who you are. Everybody does." The man paused and gave Edward a small smile.

The blond felt his cheeks going pink and hoped to the powers that be that it wasn't all that noticeable, and if it were that it be taken as embarrassment rather than infatuation.

"My name is Lieutenant Colonel Lucas Mathers. It is incredibly nice to meet you." He extended a hand.

"Oh," was all he could come up with as he took the offered hand and barely managed to move it in the up-and-down motion of hand-shaking.

"Well, I hope to see you around, but I have to get back to my office. I took my lunch break early so I could endure the entirety of my meeting without withering away and dying. I hope you have a nice day." The man smiled a rather charming smile and winked, to which Ed smiled rather awkwardly. The lt. colonel patted Ed's shoulder, and passed him to go in the direction Ed assumed Lucas's office was.

Edward watched him go, suddenly very interested in how his mind could switch from the colonel to whoever ended up in front of him so fast. It was almost as if his crush extended to everything that was good looking and had a penis.

Oh! And it didn't hurt that they weren't _too_ tall.

Mustang was the perfect height…

And now he had already forgotten that Mathers existed at all and was back to thinking about the colonel.

Mustang was tall, but he wasn't 'too' tall. He was just under six feet, a little less than a head taller than Edward. Ed could just tilt his head back and it wouldn't be too far of a distance for the older to bend and…

Edward's mind escalated quickly from a simple kiss to a ravenous fuck in the halls of military headquarters, inspiring the rest of the staff to enjoy romps of their own.

But the orgy came to an abrupt end when the fuhrer walked in and _ahemed _at the lot of them getting their jollies together. The fuhrer stood there, quietly observing before smiling and passing them with a simple, "Carry on."

That thought made Ed wince. There was no way in hell his mind should be allowed to go from good, to GOOOOOOOD, to great, to just plain weird. There should be a mental rule against that…

…or some kind of therapy…

Whatever! Food sounded fantastically appealing right about now. And Ed had other matters to think about concerning alchemy, his brother, and the philosopher's stone.

Contrary to popular belief, Edward was quite picky about his food. It didn't seem so to the others because he ate a lot, and that, he could blame on his age and his hormones. He was a growing boy, after all! But when it came to the actual food, he preferred that it taste good, was done correctly, and that there was a lot of it.

He also had a taste for foreign food.

Aerugian spices reminded him of licorice, though he knew there to be no licorice in the blends. Aerugo also made some of the best curries, only to be rivaled by Xingian curries. Aerugo had fish and other seafood from the ocean that bordered the southwest part of the country as well. The fish was transported in refrigerated trucks.

A lot of the fish in Amestris was imported more from Aerugo than Creta because the currents that brought the best fish passed Creta and came right up to Aerugian shores. There was something that came from Cretian seas that wasn't so good from Aerugo, and that was the seaweed that they used to wrap rice like the Xingians.

Cretian food was arguably his favorite. He simply had a taste for pasta and meat sauce, and there was no pasta like Cretian pasta.

It was rare to get good quality foreign food in Central, Amestris, and when he could manage to find a place that sold genuine foreign food that wasn't Amestrianized, it was usually near the borders between the countries.

There were some fancy restaurants in Central that sold delicacies from other countries, but they were too expensive and they never served enough.

The worst Amestrianized foreign food was Xingian. It was often more greasy than it should be and had a lot of sugar in it. But like any kind of food, there were some things that he could enjoy, and for him it usually involved meat, especially the beef.

Drachman food, however, was something he had never tried. He didn't think he wanted to. He could only imagine the food there was just like the people. Bland and tasteless.

There wasn't a lot of trade happening between Drachma and Amestris for obvious reasons. If there was, it usually happened underground, and things were often brought back by people that were either stupid, or clever enough to travel to Drachma without getting caught.

Wherever he traveled, he made sure to try the cuisine of the area and also made sure to scout out places with good foreign food. Edward had quite the palate.

But nobody would know that, would they? They never asked.

There was somebody that knew he appreciated her efforts to bring foreign and Amestrian food together in a pleasing blend, though.

Her name was Crista, and she worked in the military headquarters' cafeteria. She was relatively new, but already the rest of the kitchen staff didn't like her. She was young and had dreams. The lot of them had given up on their dreams long ago and thought her foolish.

But she wasn't going to give up. She will be head chef of her own seven-star restaurant someday, and Ed believed she could do it.

He'd be damned if she didn't.

And, she had a strange and rather annoying habit of kissing all of her friends when she saw them, which is why he was greeted with a pair of lips pressing against his. He hadn't realized that he had arrived in the cafeteria and was already on his way to the buffet.

His second kiss of the day, and only the first was welcomed.

He pushed her away and wiped at his mouth.

"You really need to stop doing that!" he half shouted.

The uniforms that saw or were close enough to hear started making cat calls and whistling like they did every time she kissed him or anyone else.

His face went red and he moved to grab a tray.

Crista rounded the buffet and pointed out to him the things she had made and picked out the best pieces. He smiled as they spoke briefly, but he wasn't listening to what she said, except that the pasta today had an assortment of sauces that included a thick meat sauce, a pesto sauce she made herself, and a white, alfredo sauce.

He decided to try the pesto, foregoing the meat sauce in favor to venture into a new flavor. He'd get the meat sauce next time.

"So, did you get a boyfriend, or something?"

He was immediately ripped out of his thoughts.

"What?!" His face was heating up again and he looked around, hoping that nobody had heard that.

Luckily, crista was kind enough to keep her voice down.

"Where the fuck did that question come from? What gave you that idea?"

"Calm down! Calm down! You just had 'the look' on your face." She did an imitation of a bashful, blushing girl.

"I did?" Ugh! He was capable of looking like a girl with a crush? He'd just have to fix that, won't he?

Crista was also the only person, aside from Al, that knew he was gay. That was a comfort. Sometimes when they ran into each other at the library, which happened often because she like to research cuisine as much, if not more, than he liked to research alchemy and the sciences, they would get distracted by each other and end up talking about 'boys'. Sometimes they talked about girls, but that was mostly on her end. She liked both.

Which was one of the reasons he liked her; she understood him to a degree and could relate to the confusion and embarrassment of being sexually attracted to the same sex.

She wasn't embarrassed anymore though. She was 19 years old, and already she was past the confusion and was very comfortable in her own skin.

He wished he could be like her in that respect and she often assured him he would be. He wasn't so sure that he could be, but he allowed himself the frustration of hoping at least a little that it might get easier to be himself as something of a flaming homosexual.

He sighed.

"Is it that colonel of yours?" She whispered, wiggling her brows at him.

"Shut up! I'll tell you later if I bump into you. Are you gonna be at the library later?"

"Yeah, I'm going straight there after I'm done here."

"So am I." He chewed his lip. "You'll know where to find me. But I won't be able to talk forever. I've got some things on my mind." He looked at his tray.

Juice! That was what he was missing!

"Thinking about sex?" she asked without a hint of shame.

"I am going to kill you, and I'll skin you alive, starting with those lips of yours!"

Crista laughed and waved him to a table.

"I'll see you at the library then," was all she said in response to that and he moved away to eat.

Of course he had been thinking of sex. Of course Crista would know that. She was a teenager herself.

It was said, and very easily believed almost as fact, that alchemy started in the kitchen. Really, cooking and the science weren't all that different. A recipe required a list of ingredients and putting them together required knowledge of those ingredients and how they would react to each other.

Of course one would not need to know the molecular structure of flour when baking strudels, but it was very important when placing elements together or taking them apart with alchemy.

But both required a recipe, ingredients, and a means to put them together. So to anybody, it was highly conceivable that alchemy started in the kitchen, and seeing how long alchemy had been a practice, it wouldn't hurt to say that the first alchemist was a woman.

A very amazing woman.

Gender didn't mean as much now as it did hundreds of years ago when women were at the peak of oppression. Naturally, it wasn't inconceivable that a woman had been the first alchemist.

The origins of alchemy and the similarities even now between simple kitchen activities had to have been something that could have aided in drawing Crista and Edward together.

He needed a friend outside of Alphonse, and Al had told him so before, but Edward would have none of it.

It wasn't until one day he was interrupted at the library by a very vivacious chef-to-be that Alphonse ceased his nagging. There was an immediate friendship there and Ed was all the more happy to have his precious younger brother shut up about him needing friends.

Al was all he thought he would ever need. At least, that is what he thought until puberty decided to bitch-slap him and break a few of his ribs.

Fucking hormones!

He began to have dreams he didn't know he was capable of having, and he ate even more than he already had been, which was still half the planet's rations. Now he was gearing up to eat the entire world into liquidation, but at least his best friend aside from his amazingly wonderful younger brother was an amazing cook.

Crista was definitely a keeper.

He just might have to persuade Al to marry her…

He laughed out loud at that thought.

There was no way in hell!

* * *

**This chapter was something of a filler chapter. It has everything I wanted in it in the first place, but at the same time, I needed to make sure I can get the rest of it written.**

**I cannot guarantee a chapter very soon, but I hope I should have another one out by next week.**

**Please still love me, my Cheshires!**

**Alice out!**


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